Discussion: Interesting

But you say the snow was slower and maybe you were more tired to?

Oh, something else I was wondering--have you talked to the other competitors to get a sense for how much they are in contact with the map? My sense is that you always know where you are (except for mistakes). Alex on the other hand, seems to take more chances. Was wondering what the very top people do.

Hmm, can't help but take offense to that. Maybe I'm describing it wrong. As far as I can tell, top competitors are always in contact to some degree; need to know where you're ending up even if you're simplifying.

Haven't chatted too much, with Josefina a bit after the long, because we both made the silly route choice to go up the mountain, and then a bit with Tove a few times- she does make mistakes, missed a trail junction in the WRE middle and something else in the WC middle, early on. So maybe they aren't in perfect contact, but they make fewer mistakes than both Alex and I do.

As for 'perfect contact', if there are other approaches that will let the leg be executed well they can totally be better. Sometimes I used that out there, like a fence corner, or big boulder or house - you can ignore the mess of little trails and just ski at something and that's definitely faster. But some little-trail networks really have nothing like that. Talking with Markku this morning, the suggestion is to look for distinct trail junction features, so go mostly straight and be looking to T out on another trail, or look for a loop, or something. I actually can't imagine quite how that is super helpful, but we got given a ski-o training manual (currently in draft form) so am going to study that and look for some more tips!!

If anyone is interested in this manual, give me an email, it's a big file, but can exchange via skype, apparently!

Sorry Alex, I didn't mean that in a bad way.

And thanks Ali for the explanation. The training manual sounds very interesting. I won't ask for the file but will keep in it mind.

I'll print a hard copy when we get it and can make copies.

I would be interested in knowing if they explain Batong training. Still trying to figure that out and see if it might be useful for foot sprint training as well as ski-O.